


Words Mean Things

by kho



Category: Hawaii Five-0 (2010)
Genre: Episode Tag, F/M, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-02-14
Updated: 2016-02-14
Packaged: 2018-05-20 08:19:31
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,977
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5998545
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kho/pseuds/kho
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p><i>(Episode tag for last night's V day ep, 6x14 Hoa'Inea)</i>  “You’re right,” he says quietly. “I’m sorry, Meliss, but I don’t love you.”</p>
            </blockquote>





	Words Mean Things

**Author's Note:**

> I fixed last night’s episode with an episode tag, and I swear to god it’s what happened. Show will never admit to it, but I know it’s what happened. I’m dedicating it to @weinsanedreamer and @copbydayfangirlbynight because they were so upset by last night’s heteroness, as well as to anyone else who was as well... And also to anyone who makes anything and everything McDanno in their heads like I do BECAUSE I LOVE OUR BOYS.

After he’s done, after Lou’s crack about Danny needing to hope they never solve this case so he doesn’t have to go home that’s a little too scarily close to the truth, he looks over and sees Steve smirking.

He frowns. “This is funny,” he asks, swatting Steve on the arm. “I tell you my pain, and this is funny to you?”

“Cold brah,” Kono says.

“Am I laughing,” Steve asks, gesturing to himself. His grin widens. “Did I laugh?”

“You are smirking, you asshole,” Danny says, and he’s joking, he is, except for how he really really doesn’t feel amused by this at all in the slightest. “You’re smirking at my pain, which is akin to laughing at it.”

“Okay,” Steve says, slicing his hand through the air. “Sorry, really.” He nods, but even as he bites his lip to keep from smiling he only smiles more. “It’s just. I’m realizing something.”

“What,” Danny asks, exasperated. “What are you realizing?”

“You said you don’t say I love you easily,” Steve says, gesturing.

“No, he said he means it when he says it,” Chin corrects.

“Good practice to have there, by the way,” Lou pipes in. “Don’t ever wanna say it and not mean it, that’s how you get rabbit stew on your stove.”

“What,” Kono asks on a laugh.

“Oh god are you really that young,” Danny asks, covering his face. “Are you really so young you haven’t seen Fatal Attraction?”

“Uh, no?” Kono laughs again. “I haven’t?”

“Anyway,” Steve continues. “You said you only say it when you mean it, and you know what?”

Danny rolls his eyes. “Would you stop fucking around and just say it?”

“You say it to me,” Steve says, grinning so wide and beautiful the shine of it makes Danny’s head hurt.   “All the time you say it to me.”

“You kind of do,” Chin says.

“You both do,” Lou adds.

“I think it’s sweet,” Kono says. “But to be expected.”

“Yeah, it kind of is expected,” Chin says, laughing.

“Since ya’ll are married and all,” Lou says.

“Oh ha ha, very funny,” Danny says, waiving his hand. “Yuck it up, laugh at my pain, all o’ya.”

“I’m just saying I’m honored,” Steve says with a smirk, winking at him. “Its nice to know I’m special to you.”

“You’re not special, Steven, you are not at all special in the slightest,” Danny says, glaring at him. “I don’t mean it, I take it back.”

“Doesn’t say it to me,” Lou says.

“Or me,” Chin says. “Sad, brah. I thought we were family.”

Kono makes a sad sound. “Okay well now I’m insulted, you’ve never said it to me either Danny!”

“Jesus, I love you all, okay, I love all of you,” Danny yells, throwing his hands out. “Christ!”

“But me the most, right,” Steve asks.

Danny rolls his eyes. “Fine, yes, you the most.”

“Ya’ll are so married,” Kono teases.

“Really are,” Chin says.

“The sad thing,” Lou says, and sounds uncharacteristically serious for just that moment, “is ya’ll think we’re joking.” There’s a beat. “Which, ya know. We are.”

“Mostly,” Chin says.

“But also not,” Kono adds.

Later, as Danny slides into bed behind Melissa and curls up against her warm, comfortable, familiar body, drawing her to him, he kisses the back of her neck and knows that he does not and will not love her. “You awake?”

“Yeah,” she says, and he sighs against her skin.

“You’re right,” he says quietly. “I’m sorry, Meliss, but I don’t love you.”

She turns onto her back and looks at him. He expects anger, fury, flashing painful eyes. Instead he gets kind understanding ones and the slightest little quirk of a smile. “Thank you.”

“Thank you,” he repeats, frowning.

“I know that was hard,” she says, shrugging a shoulder and reaching up to push a strand of his hair back that had fallen in his face. She scratches her nails through his hair. “You’re kind of annoyingly gallant and sweet, Danny.”

He shakes his head. “What?”

“I was beginning to think you might stay with me forever just to not have to hurt my feelings,” she says softly, eyes roaming his face but not meeting his eyes. “And I was trying to decide if I was going to let you. Because.” She looks at him then, and there’s the sadness, and it kills him. “Well. See. I _do_ love you.”

“Meliss.”

She leans forward and kisses him, soft and tender and slow but no tongue. Not their usual prelude to something more. “You’re such a great guy, Danny, you can’t really blame me for wanting to keep you for myself.”

He falls back on the bed and blinks up at the ceiling. “I’m not used to this.”

She looks at him, tilting her head to kiss his shoulder. “Used to what?”

“Uh, I’m used to anger,” he says, gesturing. “I hate you, and fuck you, and you’re a piece of shit, and you’ll never see your daughter again.”

“Oh my god,” she says, horror in her voice. “Rachel said that to you?”

He laughs. “I can’t even count how many times. Luckily, like me, her mouth gets ahead of her and cooler heads wind up prevailing later.”

“I wasn’t mad that you didn’t love me,” she says quietly. “I was mad that you were lying.”

“I never lied to you,” he says, looking at her. About that, he thinks. Not about that.

“Okay then I was mad that you wouldn’t admit it even though I asked you straight to your face,” she says, sitting up and putting her feet on the floor. She laughs slightly. “And yeah, okay, I was mad that we’ve been together for two years and you still can’t say you love me.”

“I really, honestly, Melissa, really do care about you,” he says, reaching out to curve his hand around her hip.

“I don’t doubt that at all,” she says, looking at him and smiling and then standing up. “But Danny, two years is a long time. It’s a really long time. And I’m an idiot.”

Danny closes his eyes, reaching up to scrub his face. “Please don’t. Please don’t think you’re an idiot. I’m the idiot, me, okay? Me.”

“Okay,” she says, shrugging her jeans on. He watches her sway her hips and thinks how much he’ll miss those hips. And that’s the problem, isn’t it? That he’ll miss those hips, but not necessarily much more. “We’re both idiots. Because, two years is a long time, Danny, for you to not be able to say I love you. Two years is a long time for you to not ask me to move in with you.” She raises her eyebrows at him. “And I know that. I know that and I pushed it down and just kept staying. So. I’m an idiot for that.”

He folds his arms over his stomach and stares up at the ceiling and fights the urge to continue to argue the point with her. She obviously won’t accept it. “I’m sorry.”

“Me too,” she says. “I wasted both our time.” She holds up her hand when he turns to look at her. “We _both_ wasted _both_ of our times.”

He watches her tug on a shirt, one of his. Few things are sexier than a woman wearing one of your shirts. He feels the tiniest little tug on his heart. “You deserve better.”

She turns around, looking over the room. She puts her hands on her hips and looks left to right. “Huh.”

“What,” he asks, leaning up. He looks as well. “Can’t find something?”

“Nope, I can’t,” she says, laughing and looking at him. “I can’t find a damn thing. In fact I’m wearing one of your shirts because the one shirt I had here that’s mine is the one I wore over and it has a stain on it because I spilled spaghetti on it. I don’t have any of my books here. I don’t have a drawer here for my clothes. I don’t have any jewelry here except what I had on.” She shakes her head. “I just… completely do not exist here.” She nods. “That I missed. I didn’t notice that.”

“You have a toothbrush,” he offers, but then stops because he’d never noticed before either.

Grace has books and clothes and barrettes and bandanas and scrunchies. He’d found, inexplicably, one of her three different brushes on top of the fridge somehow. Steve’s pants are in his dryer, and he’s got three of Steve’s shirts hanging up in his closet that he hasn’t returned yet.   There’s a pair of Steve’s sandals under the table in the living room that have been there for six months.

He’s always got two six packs of Longboards in the fridge because one’s not enough for both him and Steve.   He is always stacked to the gills with boxes of dry jello mix because it’s hospital food to him but Grace loves it. He has Speedstick deodorant in his spare bathroom even though he uses Gillette because Steve complained a while back that when he crashes on Danny’s couch he has to go home to put deodorant on.

“Can you do me a favor,” Melissa asks, sticking her phone in her pocket and sticking her feet into her shoes. “Can you just… Can you please find someone that it’s not a struggle for you to say those three words to, Danny? I know it’s only three words, and people say them all the time and sometimes it doesn’t mean anything when they do, but… Really, it’s kind of everything. You deserve for that to not be a struggle.”

I already have, he thinks swallowing heavily.   “Yeah,” he says, nodding and clearing his throat. “You too.”

She kisses him one last time and turns and leaves, not looking back.

An hour later he’s standing on Steve’s doorstep, turning the knob and walking in like he always does, without knocking. Steve’s sitting on the couch with Lynn and Danny freezes to the spot. This is why people knock. This is why people call first.

“You alright,” Steve asks, extracting his arm from around Lynn’s shoulders and leaning forward.

Danny throws his hands out, smiling and feeling stupid and like an oaf. “My apologies, I’m interrupting.” He bows towards Lynn. “Beg your pardon.”

“No begging needed, pardon’s are given freely.” She arches an eyebrow at him, looks at Steve, and hits Steve on the leg. “I’m gonna go read a book,” she says, standing and stretching. With a quick easy smile to Danny she bounds up the stairs and he can hear Steve’s door shut.

“Wow, you see how well she takes a hint,” Steve says on a laugh. “What’s up?”

“Hint, what hint, I said sorry, I was gonna go,” Danny says, pointing at the door.

Steve just waves a dismissive hand. “Everything okay? You have a face.”

“This is my face face,” Danny says, pacing a bit, hands on his hips. He pivots and paces the other way. “Just my regular old Danny face, being all… my face.”

Steve leans forward. “Danny?”

“We’re through. Melissa and me, we’re done,” Danny says, holding up his hand to cut Steve off before he can say anything. “It’s okay, we should have been. I knew we were. We were already. Probably since the beginning.”

“Still,” Steve says, standing. “Sorry.”

Danny holds up a finger and points at Steve. “Come with me.”

He turns and stalks into the kitchen and opens Steve’s freezer, fishing out the peppermint patties. He puts them on the counter as Steve rounds the doorway into the kitchen. “You bought these.”

Steve frowns. “What?”

“The first year we knew each other, I left a bag of peppermint patties over here and you stuck them in the freezer,” he says, gesturing. “But it’s been years and I know I’ve had more than the twenty that came in the bag at that time. You’ve, over the years, you’ve bought more.”

Steve shrugs. “You like them.”

Danny nods, throwing his hands out. “That mug,” he says, pointing. “That is my coffee mug. I always drink out of that mug. You never, ever drink out of that mug.”

Steve frowns at him. “Danny what--”

“You call Mary’s old bedroom Grace’s room,” Danny says, motioning. “You have at least four pairs of sweats here that are mine and God knows how many shirts. I know where you keep your spare sheets, the good ones, the ones you don’t give to company but you give to me when I stay over on your couch. You call them my sheets.”

Steve is shrugging, shaking his head. “Danny, what are we--”

“I keep a pair of swim trunks here,” Danny continues. “Grace keeps changes of clothes and a bathingsuit here.” He gestures, pacing back and forth, back and forth. “You don’t eat sugary cereal, but you have cocoa puffs and fruit loops for me.   Those chairs out back,” he says, pointing. “The left chair is mine, it’s mine, Steve. That is my chair.”

Steve leans back against the counter and watches, amused. It’s incredibly annoying to Danny just how amused he is when Danny’s entire fucking structure is crumbling. “Yeah, I know, you carved your initials into it.”

“See,” Danny yells, snapping his fingers. “Who does that? Who does that to someone elses furniture?!”

Steve shrugs. “I don’t mind.”

Danny covers his face and stops pacing. “Two years. Two years I dated Melissa.”

“Well one of them she was Amber,” Steve says, and then holds up his hands. “Sorry.”

“For two years I dated her, and do you know how much shit she had to cart out of my house when she left?” He throws his hands out. “Nothing. Her phone.”

Steve frowns. “Seriously?”

“She left, and she’s never coming back, and she only had to take her phone,” Danny yells, pointing at him. “I would need boxes, Steven, boxes plural, if I left here with the intention of never coming back. I exist all over this house. I exist in this kitchen, in the den, I exist upstairs, I exist in the bathroom.” He throws his hands all over the place and wants to punch things. “And you exist all over mine, and she only had to take her _phone_.”

Steve shakes his head. “Danny, what are we doing here?”

“I’m saying we’re married,” Danny says, leaning on the counter hard and glaring at him. “Somewhere over the past five years we got married, babe, and no one told me.”

Steve snorts. “Sure. We’re married. I can tell by all the sex we’ve not ever had.”

Danny takes a deep breath. “I love you. You see how easy that came out?” He points at himself. “I love you. I love you. You see? It just happens, I open my mouth and blammo, there it is. I love you.”

Steve shrugs. “And I love you too.”

“How many people do you say that to, Steve? Because me?” Danny points to himself again, swirling his finger around the general area of his head. “I couldn’t say it to Melissa. I wanted to. I wanted to say it. But I couldn’t, do you know why? Because I don’t.   I don’t love her. I wanted to love her, but I don’t. So I couldn’t say it. Because words mean things, Steve. They mean things.”

Steve sighs, scrubbing a hand over his face and shrugging. “I don’t know what you want me to say, buddy, I’m sorry.”

“There are a finite number of people I say I love you to, Steve, and you are one of them.” Danny leans forward on the counter, folding his arms on top of the surface and meeting Steve’s eyes. “My baby girl, my mom, my sisters, my pops on the rarest of occasion, and you.” Danny swallows and opens his hands. “I love you, Steve.”

“Uh.”

Steve and Danny both startle and look over at the doorway to see Lynn leaning in it. “Hey,” Steve says, starting forward.

She just looks at Danny. “So I heard shouting? And I came down because I just thought, ya know, I should just leave and say see you later.”

“I should go,” Danny says.

“No, no,” she says, laying a hand on his back. “You should not go. I should’ve just gone to begin with.”

He shakes his head. “Really, I should go.”

“I’m gone,” she says, holding her hand up and giving him a smile. “Steve, I’ll see you later.” She grins and shrugs. “Or maybe not. I’m not really sure.”

Steve doesn’t make a move to stop her as she leaves and Danny stares at him.

“Danny, what’s happening?”

Danny laughs. “I love you.”

Steve closes his eyes. “So you said.”

“Because I love you.”

Steve lets out a loud huff. “You keep fucking saying that.”

“Steve, God damnit, listen to what the fuck I am saying,” Danny yells, slamming his hands down on the counter. “I. Love. You.”

Steve’s there in front of him in seconds flat, hand on his elbow and pulling him back from the counter, turning him to face him and leaning forward to pin his back to it, eyes boring holes into Danny’s own.   “You love me.”

Danny nods. “I’m fucking _in love with you_ , man.”

Steve tastes like the cherry chapstick that Danny’s sure was Lynn’s and it makes Danny’s fists clench into his shirt and his tongue swipe out to lick it off of there, make him taste like anything that’s not cherry chapstick, make him taste like Danny and only Danny and Danny forever.

Steve’s hands come up to cup behind Danny’s ears and he slows their kiss down and Danny lets him because he’s finally starting to not taste cherries anymore.

“I love you,” Steve whispers against his lips, and Danny listens.

**Author's Note:**

> You can find me on tumblr here under [@lovethesnark](http://lovethesnark.tumblr.com). 
> 
> Fanfiction Website  
> MOST of my fic is not on AO3, though all of my H5O and beyond is as AO3 didn't exist yet and it was too much to archive. It can be found on my website at [LoveTheSnark.com](http://www.lovethesnark.com).


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